Episode 045: Ida + Elizabeth Mitchell
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I first discovered the music of the band Ida in kind of a backward way. As a dad with crazy snobby tastes in kid's music, I had heard Dan Zanes had started making family music about seven years ago when my daughter was born. As a fan of his from The Del Fuegos, I got the chance to interview him for Well-Rounded Radio in 2004. When I asked him about other artists playing "good" family music, Elizabeth Mitchell's name rose to the top (as did Ella Jenkins, who has also become a favorite of my clan).
Not long after I saw Mitchell and her husband, Daniel Littleton, perform a terrific concert at FirstNight Boston in a cavernous convention room and picked up her first two CDs, You Are My Flower and You Are My Sunshine. Any band that plays Velvet Underground covers for kids is alright with me. I was hooked. Digging a bit, I discovered that Mitchell and Littleton actually got started out playing music in the slow core band Ida, so I picked up a bunch of their earlier CDs and was equally blown away. I'll attribute the fact that I was living on the west coast for the latter part of the 90s for why this Brooklyn-based band wasn't on my radar sooner, but Ida has an impressive catalogue.
I first learned about 
About two years ago I interviewed the members of 
I first heard 
The first time I heard Piebald was about four years ago when my wife and I were visiting Seattle and at the house of my friend Marion Seymour. Her sons, 
This past winter saw the release of two debut CDs from two great pop bands that are really the perfect soundtracks for summer: New York's The Baskervilles sound right on breezy, sunny days and Boston's The Douglas Fir are the perfect accompanyment for driving around on warm, summer nights: 
Dan Zanes was the front man for The Del Fuegos in Boston for the better part of the 1980s. After four albums, numerous tours, and much acclaim, the band went their separate ways in 1990, with Zanes resurfacing later in the decade with a new approach: performing traditional and original music for all ages.
Josh Ritter has just released his third CD, "Hello Starling" on Signature Sounds Recordings, following his 1999 eponymous debut and 2002's acclaimed "Golden Age of Radio." Ritter and his band are out now on tour of the US and Europe. 
As bass player and songwriter in the influential post-punk band Mission of Burma, Clint Conley took a hiatus from the world of music after Burma broke up -- and didn't look back until 18 years later. Thankfully, Conley is making music again, both with Mission of Burma and his new band, consonant, which includes guitarist Chris Brokaw (Come, Codeine, Pullman, Steve Wynn), bassist Winston Braman (Come, Codeine, Pullman, Steve Wynn), and drummer Matt Kadane (The New Year, Bedhead, Silkworm). Conley has also struck up a unique collaboration with New York-based poet Holly Anderson while working from his home base of Boston, Massachusetts. 
